***“B Movie Blastworks” is a regular column published on Primary Ignition, written by Mark Leja, staff writer and Connoisseur of Crap, in which he scours the bowels of the internet for unsung B-Movie gems.***

TITLE: The Blob
STARRING: Kevin Dillon, Shawnee Smith, Donovan Leitch, Jeffrey DeMunn, Candy Clark, Joe Seneca, Del Close, Paul McCrane, Art Lafleur, Beau Billingslea
DIRECTOR: Chuck Russell
STUDIO: TriStar Pictures
RATED: R
RUN TIME: 95min
RELEASED:, 1988

A Fonzie-type character engages in the customary jumping of the shark moment of every teenage film. He falls flat on his face, but in The Blob, he’s got a bigger problem, he’s just fallen into a remake.

As the film starts, we get to know the townsfolk. I mean, these are your typical Mary Sue’s and John Doe’s of the movie world, with a twist: everyone wants to fuck everyone else. From what I can tell, I guess that’s the movie’s primary conflict; people who want to fuck and the situations that won’t let them.

Elsewhere, there’s a homeless man walking a dog when suddenly, a pink asteroid comes out of the sky and crashes into the woods. After some comic relief, he pokes the asteroid with a stick, and this jello-like substance comes out and eats his fucking face!!! Wait, I got that wrong. It eats his hand; the Blob can’t eat too much.

Meanwhile, the guy from before — he goes by the name Paul — is taking out Maggie, some cheerleader, to the woods for some reason. While this is going on, Fonzie is fixing his bike when the homeless man comes at him waving an axe! He chops off his arm, but the Blob won’t let him go and it freakin’ dissolves his hand. He’s picked up by Paul and Maggie and they have to decide, hospital or flesh wound?

Hospital it is, the homeless man is brought to the hospital where the first question is: What kind of insurance does he have? Welcome to Amurica. The homeless dude is then taken away to a fate uncertain. Later on, Paul walks up to the homeless man, and his eyes roll back and — OH SHIT — he’s been ripped in half! The cops are called and while they talk Paul doesn’t see the Blob crawling right above him, until it’s too late. The Blob completely envelopes him, and he dies an extraordinarily painful death.

Maggie passes out from the sight; well that’s the end of Paul. Next character — the Fonzie Wannabe — well his real name is Brian Flagg and he’s got a problem. He’s been blamed for the murder. But it wasn’t him, he was framed by the Blob! After eating some teenagers in a sick display of 80s special effects, The Blob descends upon the town. Maggie tries to pick up Brian after he’s released from interrogation, but fails. He’s too cool to love. She follows him into a restaurant and needs his help. They need to team up and destroy the Blob, but they don’t know that yet. They enjoy some pie while a waitress heads in back to do her waitress chores but wonders why the kitchen sink is a little backed up.

She starts to use a plunger like most people, but she’s a woman, so a guy comes to her rescue and plunges away. He reaches his hand in to clear the drain when — what do you know? —the Blob sucks HIS FUCKING FACE in the sink. Brian and Maggie flee the creature; they head into the freezer and realize it hates the cold. The waitress flees as well into the alleyway but there’s no escaping The BLOB! She tries to call the police using a pay phone but like most pay phones, it doesn’t work. The booth gets devoured by the creature in yet another display of awesome special effects.

Brian gets out the best possible weapon to fight a gelatinous creature, a meat hook. They escape the diner and head off into the woods to find a police officer, but instead they find some government agents who are hunting the bacteria that fell off of the asteroid. The film cuts to a movie theater where THE BLOB FROM ANOTHER WORLD ATTACKS! is playing.

Brian and Maggie are taken away on a bus because the whole town is under quarantine. Brian breaks out, Maggie stays in the bus. The Government shuts down the town and is trying their best to control hysteria. Then after way too long, the Blob attacks the movie theater in homage to the original film. The theater patrons are sent screaming, running to the hills. Maggie runs into the theater only to see the Blob eating everything and saves her kid brother and his friend.

They escape into the sewers, which are the best hiding place; after all, it’s not like a blob-like creature could ever get there. Brian is in the woods catching a glimpse of the asteroid. Turns out the Blob was created by the Army to put themselves ahead of the Russians. It is because of the Cold War. Brian finds out about the conspiracy, and the government is trying to put him down. He jumps the shark again, this time succeeding and evades government eyes, making his way into the sewer system to rescue Maggie from the Blob. Maggie is being pursued by the Blob which has eaten her brother’s friend. The government intervenes, but like most government interventions, it doesn’t go as planned.

Maggie gets picked up by Brian who uses his motorcycle to drive to an exit, but the government has sealed it shut. He turns and faces the Blob; yeah, he’s going to do it again. He jumps the Blob. They get the help of a soldier. They try to find a way out but the big government guy, Meadows is a jerk. He’s locked them down there. But Brian won’t take that, he takes the government dude’s rocket launcher and finds them a way out, by blowing shit up.

They engage in a Mexican Standoff on the surface until the Blob eats Meadows. Then, it’s war. The Blob vs. Humanity. The humans fight blob with fire, but it’s to no effect. Maggie finds out that a fire extinguisher actually hurts the Blob. Remember? Cold bad! Armed with fire extinguishers, the humans fight off the creature. Brian drives in with a Snow Maker, freezing the creature but not enough as he rams it with his car, but bounces off. Maggie runs outside and starts shooting at the thing to save Brian, she plants a bomb to detonate a freezing solution and escapes with Brian in the nick of time.

The Blob is frozen and the day is saved, and everyone lives happily ever after. The film ends with a crazy priest who survived the Blob attack. Afterwards he goes to get a drink. A woman walks up to him and asks when the end shall come and he says “Soon.” Then he picks up a jar filled with a remnant of the blob.

A remake of the original 1950′s B-Movie, this one sports better special effects and a higher budget. The original has a larger camp value but this one is for the gore fan. The Blob has lots of face melting and lots of good old 80s special effects. Blast that Glam rock; it’s a fun ride the whole time.

RATING: 8/10

Front page image from athewanderingimage.blogspot.com, interior stills from thelightningbugslair.com.